


the past is just a bridge that we burned down behind us

by ohallows (dean_n_pie)



Series: our story isn’t done [3]
Category: DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Bonding, M/M, Series, kon and bart are best friends you fools
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-19
Updated: 2018-05-19
Packaged: 2019-05-09 02:29:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14707397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dean_n_pie/pseuds/ohallows
Summary: Bart talks. A lot more than he wants to.





	the past is just a bridge that we burned down behind us

**Author's Note:**

> shrugs 
> 
> title is from 'lightning tent' by wildlife which i basically listened to the entire time i was writing this fic!
> 
> enjoy!
> 
> (actually tho some quick notes about this bc some of the comments on the previous fic were Yikes: tim and bart are not in a mentor/mentee relationship and I don't understand that interpretation of their relationship. like you do you, but this might not be the fic for you if that's how you interpret their relationship :). secondly, there will not be bart/jaime in this fic.  
> uh also i. reread the first two parts (esp the fic right before this in the series) and i feel like i may have unintentionally made it seem like bart was almost forcing tim to comfort him? which wasn't my intention at all -- bart has feelings for tim (obv) and tim has complicated emotions toward bart (which i'm trying to get around to resolving) idk just wanted to clarify that this IS NOT intended to be a relationship that has a power/emotional imbalance :) [also, bart misreads situations sometimes! it's from his POV for a reason]
> 
> ok thats it i love my kids and im sorry this is updated randomly

“Hi Joan! Bye Joan!” Bart yells, speeding down the stairs and grabbing the toast out of Joan’s hand as he snatches his backpack up from the ground.

“Normal speed outside the house!” Joan calls after him, but he can hear her laughing so he takes one millisecond to run back and give her a quick kiss on the check before he’s yelling a quick “Thanks!” and speeding to school. He blows by the school bus and stops in his normal spot behind the trees, stuffing the Kid Flash suit back into his ring. Kids spill off of the bus, laughing and chatting with each other as they head up the steps to the school. Bart joins them without anyone really noticing.

He doesn’t really like his new school, and he never has, but Manchester isn’t his home anymore and the principal made it clear last time that without guardians living in the area he can’t go there anymore. Since Helen moved, and Max is... gone, this is his only option.

But he still misses Carol and Preston, and Rolly, and everyone else at Manchester. A lot.

He kicks numbly at the step as he walks, stuffing his hands into his pockets and frowning. Just before he gets into the building he hears a familiar ‘whoosh’, catching the familiar black-and-red out of the corner of his eyes. Bart’s eyes flash as he fights against the tide of people streaming into the school, and eventually just huffs our a sigh of frustration and vibrates a little bit faster, pushing through the crowd and apologizing as he goes.

People move out of his way quickly enough as the crowd begins to thin. He hears the warning bell ring as he finally breaks through the last group of people and, looking around to be sure that he’s out of sight of both people and the new security cameras the school got (Max did teach him something, after all), speeds off into the forest next to the school.

“Is there a Titans emergency? Superboy Prime or something? Deadshot? Need me to run really fast and punch supervillians a lot?” Bart asks, all the while desperately hoping for a yes so that he doesn’t need to spend what feels like an entire millennia sitting through Mr. Connors’ lecture on why the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.

Kon just laughs. “No, dude, I’m just bored and Clark is off-world so he can’t get mad at me if I don’t go to school today.”

Bart definitely doesn’t think that’s true, because even when Max wasn’t in the, uh, general universe as it were, he had no trouble yelling at Bart for stupid stuff he pulled while Max was away. Not to mention how Max always seemed to have a preternatural sense (one that Joan shares) for seeing through Bart’s excuses.

“So, thoughts? Wanna ditch?” Kon asks, hanging upside down in midair. There’s a glint of something near his face and Bart squints, realizing that it’s coming from the diamond inset in Kon’s ear.

“When’d you start wearing an earring again?” he asks, cocking his head to the side. “Is that a real diamond? All the ones you used to have were fake.”

“That’s not an answer,” Kon says, rolling his eyes. “And it’s fake, I’m not just gonna fly around with a diamond in my ear.”

“Yeah, definitely not you, mr. ‘guess I’m gonna have to sue Superman because my literal actual hired agent trademarked that brand while he was dead’,” Bart says, snorting. It’s all true, and Kon knows it, because he grimaces and flips around, sinking down to the ground to stand and lean against a tree.

“I told Rex - nevermind, you in?” Kon scratches at the back of his neck and Bart is suddenly, almost violently aware of the fact that this is one of if not the first times he’s been like, truly alone with Kon since he came back a few months ago. Everytime him and Kon have hung out, there’s been a buffer there: Tim, or Jaime, or Cassie, or anyone else on the Titans team. He doesn’t like this, this feeling of awkwardness that he’s never had with Kon before, and he doesn’t know how much Tim told him about the year he was gone, or anything Tim told him about Bart getting lost in the speedforce, or anything else that Kon might -

“Suresuresure, yeah, no problem, school is boring, let’s go,” he hears himself say before he can really think it through. But like, at the same time, he doesn’t want to go to school, and he’s going to need to talk to Kon about... everything, anyway, so why not now? “What’s the plan?”

Kon shrugs. “Dunno, but I’ve kinda really been missing Hawaii ever since I got back.”

Bart shoots him a grin. “I haven’t been to the beach in a while... Race you there?” At Kon’s smirk, he crouches down to get into his ready position.

“One.... twothreeGO!” he yells, taking off and laughing while Kon yells from behind him. In no time at all he’s running over water, hair getting soaked from the spray and immediately drying in the wind. He keeps laughing even as he hears Kon behind him, swearing louder and louder the closer they get to the island.

Bart sees Oahu in the distance and kicks it up a notch, artificial knee twinging a bit as he reaches a higher speed than what he usually gets.

(Ever since Deathstroke put a shotgun to his knee, he’s tried to keep a cap on his speed just to be safe, and only broken it a few times. Like now, when he really desperately needs to beat Kon and get to Hawaii first.)

With the water spraying up behind him and Kon yelling as he gets splashed, it almost feels like any normal day back in Young Justice, Bart doing anything he can to rile Kon up because it was hilarious and because it was easy, especially when Tim and the girls were away.

He breaks onto the Big Island first, laughing ecstatically as Kon swears from behind him. He’s only on land for a split second before he’s back running on water, wind whipping his hair back as he speeds on.

And then he realizes he doesn’t know where to go, at all, which might be a little bit of a problem if he actually wants to be able to talk to Kon. He slows down a little bit (just enough to get under the sound barrier) and starts running in long circles, giving Kon the chance to catch up with him.

Kon makes a weird complicated hand signal and Bart blinks at him for a fraction of a second, until his brain categorizes what he’s seeing and he nods in agreement, speeding off after Kon.

Back in YJ, they created a series of hand signals for when they were moving too fast to speak and they needed to communicate across a battlefield. But they haven’t used it in - in years, probably, at least not since YJ and it’s definitely been long enough that Bart just assumed Kon forgot about it the way he forgets other things from back then.

Whatever. He follows Kon as he banks back toward Oahu, heading toward Kaua’i.

As the island comes into view, Bart is struck by the sharp green that comes with it, casting an emerald tint onto the ocean that crashes onto the rocks below a cliff. He speeds up the sides to find Kon sitting on the flat surface of the cliff, laying down against the rock with his arms behind his head.

One eye cracks open as Bart stutters to a halt next to him, then slips closed again as Kon pushes himself to a sitting position.

“Took you long enough,” he grumbles, and Bart doesn’t think that he’s being serious because it was maybe only just three seconds but there’s just that hint of something uncomfortable in the air that’s making him read the situation entirely strangely. Either way, he awkwardly picks at

the lightning bolt on his uniform, laughing along as Kon stretches out, bones in his spine cracking.

“So we, uh -“ Kon starts, and Bart’s thoughts immediately stop, crashing into each other as he blinks rapidly, staring resolutely off into the distance instead of anywhere near Kon. “We should probably talk. About when I was gone.”

Bart doesn’t answer, and Kon waits for maybe thirty seconds that feel like hours upon days upon years before he sighs and starts talking again, obviously done waiting for Bart to respond.

“Tim, he uh - he told me a lot about what happened. How he tried to clone me. How fucked up he was,” he says, and Bart can’t look at him, he can’t, but he can hear the roughness in Kon’s voice and he bites at his bottom lip, because he /knows/. He knows just how far Tim almost went. How far he could have gone. How much worse it could have turned out, if Tim had been successful.

They’d both almost lost him. They could have, so easily.

“Yeah,” Bart says, quiet and shaky, because nothing prepared him for seeing the cloning equipment in the basement and just knowing, intrinsically, how wrong it was. At least he’d been able to get through to Tim before any lasting effects could be done. “It was really shitty to watch.”

Kon nods and they sit in silence for a while, staring off into the distance. The sun is barely peeking over the sea as a soft wind brushed against their skin, smelling like salt from the ocean.

“I talked to Cassie. She told me a little bit about what Tim was going through right - right, uh. Right after. You know.”

Bart knows. It’s not - it’s not something he can ever forget. He still sometimes has nightmares of screams echoing around him as Kon’s... body from that day flashes through his mind, like he’s unable to escape. “It was bad.”

Kon winces a little bit. “I uh - I wanted to talk to you about that. I know - Tim told me everything that happened while I was gone. About you two.”

Bart‘s hands are shaking. And he knows, he knows they needed to have this conversation, but it just - it feels so much worse, so much more all-encompassing than he thought and he doesn’t want Kon to hate him but /what if Kon hates him/, and he - he can’t breathe.

“Bart? Hey, man, take a deep breath. It’s all good, I just need you to breathe - okay?” Kon is saying, hands on Bart’s shoulders, and Bart is reaching up and holding on as he listens to Kon’s instructions, feeling his molecules settle as his breathing evens out.

He swallows, heavily, and takes a slight step back, Kon’s hands sliding from his shoulders.

“Uh, sorry,” he says, voice quiet.

“Nothing to be sorry about, man. I still get panic attacks in the middle of the night,” Kon replies, shoving his hands into his pockets as he rocks back on his heels. “Can’t imagine why everyone doesn’t want to be a superhero. PTSD and anxiety through the damn roof, huh?”

Bart chuckles but it doesn’t... sound right, and he knows that Kon notices because he can see him frown slightly.

“Hey, uh -“ Kon says, looking out across the sea. “What brought that on?”

Bart chews on the inside of his cheek. “Guess I just didn’t realize how awkward talking about it was gonna be.”

“Dude, that was way past ‘awkward’ and into full-on hyperventilating. You don’t have to lie to me.”

Bart nods slightly. “Dunno, I just. I didn’t want to have to hear that you hate me.”

Kon tilts his head, brow pulling together in confusion. “Hate you? Why the fuck would I hate you?”

Silence. Bart looks at him with a weird mix of disbelief and confusion and a small small piece of hope. He isn’t - this - he thought - wait. Breathe.

“I mean because - me and Tim, I thought?” Bart says, and he’s refusing to let that small

hope bloom into anything more, because Kon might not -

“Dude, no, you’re my best friend, why the hell would I be pissed at you for that? I was dead,” Kon says, wrapping an arm around his shoulders as they both lean back against the boulder, warmed by the rising sun. “Me being pissed at you would be dumb as hell.”

Bart fiddles with his hand in his lap and doesn’t look up, can’t.

“Bart,” Kon says, and it’s serious in a way he rarely is, just enough that it convinces Bart to look up and actually make eye contact with him. “I’m not mad at you, the last time I was, like, actually mad at you was when you spilled paint all over me back in YJ. I don’t care that you and Tim were together. I just want to make sure that you’re doing okay because you’re my best friend, man.”

“Even before Cassie?” Bart hedges, letting a weak smile spread over his face.

“You, Cassie, Tim... I love you guys, you’re all my best friends, it’s not a contest. Plus Cassie can definitely break me in half over her knee,” Kon says, grabbing a twig and snapping it over his knee to demonstrate. “And then where would I be?”

Bart laughs, quiet, and his mind might still be yelling but he can’t stop the smile from taking over his face, as he leans into Kon’s side. The sense of absolute and utter relief he feels is nearly overwhelming, and he tilts his head back against the rock behind them and tells his brain to shut up, and tells his hands to stop shaking.

They sit there in silence for a while as the sun slowly rises above the mountains, casting the world in a bright light. Bart fiddles with a rock by his side just to do something with his hands, and Kon starts laughing.

Bart turns toward him and tilts his head, confused. “What?”

Kon keeps laughing. “I can’t believe you thought I hated you, man. That’s, like, probably impossible.”

Bart can feel his face flush in what almost feels like embarrassment, and he can’t help but laugh along with Kon. “Hey, it could have happened! You might have turned into more of a dick after you died, I didn’t know.”

“Hey!” Kon accuses, shoving at Bart a little bit. “Come on, man, give me a little credit.”

“Guess it was kind of ridiculous,” Bart muses, flicking the little rock away with his finger, wincing as it stings his fingernail.

“Nah, not ridiculous. But you gotta know I could never hate you, dude. After everything we’ve been through? I mean, Apokolips? Nothing’s gonna break that bond, dude. Don’t care that you dated my boyfriend.”

“Okay,” Bart says, and for the first time in what feels like... such a long time, he doesn’t feel guilty, he doesn’t feel awkward and nervous and like everything is gonna fall around him. “You’re pretty great too, I guess.”

“Damn right,” Kon says, preening a little bit.

Bart can’t help but laugh.

—

When he gets home, someone is sitting at the table with Joan, chuckling quietly over a huge mug of tea and turning to face Bart as the door opens.

“Hey, sweetie,” Iris says, smiling fondly over at Bart. Bart grins and runs to her, hugging her tight.

“Grandma!” he calls, squeezing a little bit. It’s been a while since he’s been able to see her, and even though present Iris is great and fully willing to slap Wally upside the head when he’s treating Bart like a baby, it just isn’t the same. “How did you come back? Is Mom with you? How’s Carol? I bet she’s doing great, she’s always doing great, I miss her a lot though, and -“

“One question at a time, baby,” Iris laughs, kissing Bart on the cheek and squeezing him back just as tight. “I missed you - your mom wanted to come back with me but she’s busy managing your grandfather. It’s a full-time job. And Carol is wonderful, she asked me to tell you that she says hello.”

Bart grabs a cookie from the table and takes a big bite, using a napkin to catch the crumbs as they tumble down.

“So Bart,” Joan says, sharing what can only be described as a conspiratorial look with Iris. “How was school today?”

Bart immediately begins sweating. See, he wasn’t kidding about that preternatural sense earlier, it’s terrifying.

“It was... great,” he hedges, trying to inject much more enthusiasm in his voice. “Moira passed out while we were dissecting frogs and me and another guy had to carry her to the nurses room. And then during lunch a couple of the kids tried to start a food fight, but Bob, our security guard, he jumped right in and they stopped immediately somehow, I don’t know how because I don’t think Bob’s that intimidating, but these kids just backed down. I also -“

“Bart,” Joan interrupts, fond smile on her face. “We know you didn’t go to school today.”

He freezes in his tracks. “Uh. How? I mean. It’s definitely wrong, I was definitely in school today!”

Joan laughs. “Sweetie, we’re not mad.”

Bart gapes at her. “Really?”

“Well, we were a little bit, at first. But you’re smiling, and I mean really smiling, for the first time in what feels like ages, so we’ve decided to let you off the hook this time,” Joan explains.

“Oh. Awesome!” Bart says, grinning. Joan shakes her head but she’s smiling, so she’s definitely really not mad. Cool.

“Don’t do it again though,” she warns, winking at him. “School is important.”

Bart nods emphatically, because what else is he going to do, disagree? After Joan is letting him off the hook? He’s not /stupid/.

“Bart, honey,” Iris says, laying a hand on his arm. “Let’s go sit outside and chat for a bit, it’s a beautiful day and I think the porch swing out front needs some love.”

“Okay!” Bart says, scrambling up from his seat. He’s really really really missed his grandmother and, especially after everything, being able to see her always lifts his mood.

Iris smiles at him and pours two glasses of iced tea, handing one over to Bart. “Joan, do you mind?” she asks, pushing her chair in.

“Of course not,” Joan says, waving her off. “I need to go start dinner - Jay will be back soon and I imagine Wally, Linda, and the kids will want to come over if they hear that you’re staying for dinner.” The two women hug as Bart vibrates in place, before giving Joan a quick kiss on the cheek and dashing out to the porch, careful not to spill the iced tea in his hand.

Iris follows after a little more slowly, setting down her iced tea on the table next to them before she sinks down into the porch swing and grabs Bart’s hand in her own, stroking it softly.

“What’s wrong, honey?” Iris asks. “And don’t tell me it’s about Carol or someone back in Manchester, this is something else.”

Bart grimaces a little bit, because he really doesn’t want to talk about it, but he’s still reeling a little from the conversation with Kon, and he might be able to think faster than the average human but in no way does he process things faster than anyone. Retaining information doesn’t always mean anything, especially when it’s all jumbled and contradicting with mixed messages and... yeah. But Iris is probably one of the people he trusts the most on this entire planet (no offense to Jay and Joan, Bart loves them a lot and they mean the world to him, but nothing will ever beat out Grandma. Because Grandma makes... everything okay.)

“So I guess a ‘nothing’ is out of the question?” Bart tries to joke, but even he can tell that it comes out flat and weak. He swallows heavily and slumps down in the porch chair, staring intently at the glass of iced tea in his hands. Iris, to her credit, doesn’t say anything, just sits in the wicker chair across from Bart and waits.

“Can I just say it’s a Teen Titans problem and not talk about it?” he tries, giving Iris a small grin that he knows doesn’t reach his eyes. Iris folds her arms and leans back in the chair, raising her eyebrow at Bart. He huffs out a breath.

The bird chirp all around them as a soft breeze blows across the deck, dancing around the windchimes as they ring throughout the entire yard. Bart turns and stares at them until they stop moving. Maybe... maybe if he jumps up now and runs, he’ll be able to get away. The optimism quickly turns sour when he realizes that Iris most definitely has both Wally and Jay on speed dial on her phone and will definitely call one of them to bring him back. Only one solution.

“It’s just - it’s been a really stupidly long year,” he says finally, playing with his fingers in his lap. “I don’t - I don’t know how much you know?”

Iris shrugs a little bit. “I do live in the future, so it’s fair to say I’m a little more informed than most. But I want to hear it from you. Not everything ends up in history books.”

Bart sighs, because he’s already gone through this with Kon, but maybe he should actually listen to the therapists he sees on TV and talk about things. Gross.

Because here’s the thing. Bart’s talkative, he always has been. Silence is barely tolerable at best, torturous at worst. It’s a speedster thing, or so he’s been told. Speedsters might be talkative, but that doesn’t mean they actually say anything important. Bart can babble on and on about theoretical physics laws but his emotions are a completely different category.

But Iris is looking at him so patiently and he’s just... he’s missed her so much, and even though seeing her reminds him of Carol and his mom... he feels like it might just be time to actually talk.

“Um, so. Okay, about a year ago, we were in this huge battle against Superboy Prime, I don’t know if you know about it, but. Kon - Conner, Superboy - he died and um. Me and Tim and Cassie, we all. We all kinda lost it. I mean, everyone did, but like, we were the most messed up, because we were his best friends, and we were - we were all right there. He - it was so bad, Cassie was holding him, and then Tim came running and I came back and just. He - he was gone.

“And then we just, we all. It was so messy, we were all in mourning, and Cassie seemed to be able to function the best out of all of us, like she always does.” Bart smiles a little bit, leaning into Iris’ side. Cassie has always been the strongest out of all of them, and he’s always respected her for that. She deserves the world.

Iris nods encouragingly when he stalls a little bit, and he knows how to tell this next part because he lived it and he’s lived it again at least eight times since it all ended, usually in dreams that he wakes up from sweating and feeling like there’s something missing.

“Ti- Robin, uh. Robin kinda went off the deep end. He wasn’t talking, he wasn’t sleeping, and neither was I but at least I had Wally and Jay and Joan to help me out and make sure I was eating and doing okay. Rob just had his older brother and Batman, and Batman was away for a good portion of it and Nightwing was just. In a different city. Not that Rob would have ever asked for help, either, but-“

“I’m so sorry you had to go through that,” Iris says, and hugs him a little tighter. She smells the same. Honeysuckle and mint. “I wish I were here for you.”

“It’s okay,” Bart says, shrugging. “Jay and Joan were great.”

Iris nods, pensively. “So what happened after that?”

“This is, kinda, uh, where everything gets convoluted. Rob - oh by the way, Robin and Superboy had been together before Kon died. Anyway, Rob started building a cloning project below Titans Tower and was trying to bring Kon back and it was just -

he was trying so hard and nothing was working and I knew it was wrong but I -“ and Bart swallows heavily, squeezing his eyes shut because he can’t see Iris’ reaction, because he hasn’t admitted this to anyone, barely even acknowledged it himself, but - “I... I knew it was bad. I did, but I wanted - I wanted it to work and I know how wrong that is because it wouldn’t have been him but I just. I wanted Kon back too, I didn’t want him to be gone forever like Max.” His voice cracks on the last work and it’s like the dam breaks, as all of the things he’s been feeling and pushing down down down raise to the surface.

“I miss Max,” Bart says, sniffling. “I miss Carol and I miss Jesse and Preston and Mom and Grandpa and everyone and I miss Tim and I missed Kon so much when he was gone and if Kon came back why couldn’t Max, why couldn’t Max come back too? I know he’s smart enough, I know he is, I need him to come back and yell at me for being irresponsible and lazy and for not thinking and -“

He’s cut off by Iris wrapping him into a powerful hug, pressing his head into his shoulder. Her shirt is damp, and it’s only then that Bart realizes he’s crying, tears flowing onto Iris’ shirt as his emotions finally break.

“I’m - I’m just so tired, I don’t - I want everyone to be back and I want things to be the way they used to be, I -“ he chokes out, as Iris strokes the back of his head and hums the song she used to sing to him every night before he was stuck being researched by his grandfather.

“That’s okay, baby, you can feel all of that. It’s okay,” Iris says soothingly, and Bart’s brain kind of. Stops.

Not because he didn’t know that it’s okay to have a whole bunch of feelings, but because he just didn’t really realize it, it didn’t resonate with him, he just kept pushing it down and down instead of dealing with it.

But it’s - it’s okay to feel this way, and Iris just saying that, just saying that it’s okay to have all of these negative emotions and to let them out... it’s something Bart didn’t really consider, and he doesn’t know how he didn’t.

His tears subside slowly, all of the exhausting emotion he’s dealt with over the past few years finally releasing from where it’d been compressing in his chest and making it hard to breathe. He breathes in slowly and tries to calm himself down. Iris is still holding him tightly and he focuses on that, on her grip and her hand in his hair and her soft voice murmuring how he’ll be okay eventually. He calms down in Iris’ embrace and feels his body stop shaking, feels his head clearer than it’s been in a while.

Turns out even his conversation with Kon earlier wasn’t enough to lighten the load in his chest. But Iris just tugged at it slowly until it snapped. He feels lighter.

“You should come visit me,” Iris says, slowly stroking his hair. “When everything’s calmed down over here and you’re feeling up to it. Your mom is developing this new tech that will let us see each other more often. Sound good?”

Bart makes a noncommittal humming noise that he immediately follows up with a nod, because he wants to visit his grandma and mom more often, because they’re both really really cool.

Maybe he and Wally can go and visit. That way he won’t be alone.

—

Bart lives for the weekends. After a week of sitting through lectures about things that Bart already knows because he read all the textbooks on the first day fast, the weekends are a welcome break from the monotony of his daily life. But Sunday always comes too fast, rushing at Bart before he even has time to truly appreciate the weekend and the chance to just get away. Most people leave early on Sundays, wanting to get home for dinner or to finish their homework, or to do literally anything else. Normally, Bart would be one of them (not because of the homework, obviously, that won’t take Bart more than a minute at most, if he has to actually think about the questions this week. It hasn’t happened yet but there’s a first time for everything.), trying to get home to get some of Joan’s roast duck or whatever she was making. But Jay and Joan are out on a much-deserved getaway, and Bart’s staying with Wally and Linda for the week until they get back.

Him and Wally have a much better relationship than they used to, but Bart still does hold a little bit of resentment for how obvious Wally was about not wanting to deal with him, just foisting him off onto Max instead of even trying to make an effort. Bart isn’t mad, or anything, because living with Max ended up being one of the best parts of his life even if he complained and it ended way quicker than he thought it would.

But there’s just that little pocket of something, he isn’t sure what, because it isn’t resentment and it isn’t despair and it isn’t longing and it isn’t regret, sitting right under his chest next to the knot that he’s beginning to get accustomed to feeling every time he glances at Tim and sees Tim watching him back.

It’s Sunday night and everyone else is gone, Bart standing on the edge of the roof as he sways slowly in the wind, gearing up to make the short run back to Jay and Joan’s house. He runs a hand through his hair and lets the Kid Flash costume jump out of the ring. /Time to go/, he thinks, already salivating at whatever Joan is making for dinner.

A sound from behind him jolts him from his thoughts as he whirls around, nearly stumbling off the edge of the roof before rebalancing himself with a strategic whirl of his arms. He lands with a thud back on the roof of the tower and groans as he pushes himself up to rest on his forearms.

“Thought I was the last one leaving,” Bart says, glancing up and immediately feeling his stomach drop to somewhere around his knees.

Tim is standing there in his civvies, dark sunglasses covering his eyes and a hoodie pulled up over his hair. He shuffles awkwardly from side to side; it’s one of the ways that Bart notices the differences between Robin and Tim. Robin is still, silent. Tim is... awkward, clumsy.

“No costume?” Bart asks, trying to break the silence. Tim shakes his head and pulls down the hood to his sweatshirt, running a hand through his damp hair.

“Nah,” Tim says, laughing a little bit. “It’s late, and Nightwing is busy so he needs to drop me right off at home when we get back to Gotham. And I hate changing in the plane.”

Bart snorts, quietly, as they both lapse back into silence, uncomfortable tension in the air.

“Do you think there’s a universe where we work?”

The second the words are out in the open Bart slaps his hands over his mouth, mind yelling ‘TRAITOR TRAITOR TRAITOR’ at his nonexistent brain-to-mouth filter.

“Waitwaitwait I didn’t -“ he manages to get out around his hands pressing against his mouth as he mentally beats his own brain with a large metal bat. He refuses to look up at Tim, heart beating so fast he can hear it, feeling as though it’s about to leap out of his chest. “Can we - canweplease -pretendIneversaidthatIdidn’t -“ he stutters out, and he knows he’s talking too fast for Tim to understand him anymore but that doesn’t matter.

It - why couldn’t he just keep his mouth shut, why couldn’t he just not - “Bart.”

He looks up through his fingers at Tim, expecting to see pity or confusion or regret or something else that will make his stomach fall through the floor again. But he only finds sympathy and even a bit of consideration, as though maybe...

“It could be true,” Tim says, reaching out slowly before his fingers twitch and he awkwardly pulls his arm back, moments before it would have touched Bart’s shoulder. “We know there’s a number of different universes out there. Who knows what it’s like in other worlds?”

Bart nods. “When - when I was stuck in the speedforce, I...” he swallows heavily, looking off toward the side and speaking quietly. “I bounced around a few different universes I think. Timelines, maybe? I don’t know, it was weird, but I always ended up in some form of the Tower, and I just. I saw you a lot, I don’t know why but. I did.”

Tim nods, looking pensive. “Bart, I-“

Just on cue, there’s a roaring sound of an engine and Bart glances up slowly as a jet lands perfectly on the roof of Teen Titans HQ. The engine turns off with a whine as the hatch opens, Nightwing waving from the cockpit.

“I’m coming!” Tim calls over to him, turning back to Bart for a moment. Bart waves back to Nightwing and stifles a laugh when he makes a spectacle out of checking his non-existent watch behind Tim’s back.

Tim’s lips twist, and if there’s a hint of bitterness there Bart only notices it because of how many time’s he’s tried to memorize Tim’s face.

See, Bart has an eidetic memory, something even Barry and Wally missed out on when it comes to the Flash powers. And he might be able to memorize the exact location of the 214th use of the word ‘the’ in the Encyclopedia Brittanica and he might be able to categorize Tim’s facial expressions ten times over but that doesn’t always mean he gets the interpretation right. In a moment the expression fades, and Tim sighs slightly.

“I’ll see you next week?” Tim asks, giving him a slight smile, lips upturned gently. Bart nods, chewing on the inside of his cheek, before returning the smile and giving a little wave as Tim closes the hatch on the jet. The jet lifts off the ground and Bart can only just make out Nightwing waving down to him through the dark before it’s off, speeding away toward Gotham in the night.

Bart stands there, alone on top of the tower, and turns to face the sea below them.

It’s. It’s going to be okay. He’s going to be okay, and even if things are a little awkward

for a while it’s not - it’s not going to change things. Him and Kon are still good, and him and Tim are still best friends, and that’s really what matters anyway so, like. He’s good. He’s dealing. It might take a little while and he might just take Iris up on that offer to visit her in the future when everything’s calmed down a bit.

Bart smiles. And he runs.


End file.
